Water Quality Reports

Water Quality Testing

The Province of British Columbia issues water licenses to the City under the Water Act. Our drinking water dams and the use of the water for public consumption and fisheries augmentation are clearly spelled out by the licenses we hold.

We are fortunate to have a high quality surface water supply. The water collected from rain and snowmelt at the headwaters of the South Fork of the Nanaimo River produce a high quality and good tasting product.

Water quality is driven by the Drinking Water Protection Act and Regulation. Our annual water quality sampling program exceeds the requirements of the legislation. We sample over 2,000 times annually to monitor water quality. To date, all tests have shown that our water meets the legislation and the Canadian Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality. This success is attributed to the cooperative management between the City and the land owners.

The water quality testing program has continually been modified to keep up with current regulations against outside laboratories' testing of the water to the lowest levels for micro biological and chemical contamination.

The water is tested at the source, the South Fork Water Treatment Plant and throughout the distribution system on a regular basis. The water sampling points were selected to cover all of the water system zones and where the most likely water problems would occur.

The program includes daily tests for coliforms, monthly tests for total organics, disinfection by products, cryptosporidium and giardia lamblia, hetrotrophic plate counts, and semi annual full spectrum analysis of the water from the watershed.

Actual water quality may vary as a result of weather changes in the watershed, or as a result of changes to operating procedures during maintenance to water supply and distribution systems.